I’m told this is a series about an autistic kid who can see the future, just like the heroin addict in Tim Kring’s “Heroes.”

Kring is making this one without the great Bryan Fuller, who wrote all of “Heroes’” best episodes.

Look! Press release!

FOX has ordered 13 episodes of the new drama series TOUCH, created and written by Emmy-nominated Tim Kring (“Heroes”), it was announced today by Kevin Reilly, President of Entertainment, Fox Broadcasting Company. TOUCH, starring Emmy and Golden Globe winner Kiefer Sutherland, will join the schedule in the spring of 2012. The pilot was directed and executive-produced by Francis Lawrence (“Water for Elephants”), and the show comes from Chernin Entertainment and Tailwind Productions, in association with 20th Century Fox Television.

“TOUCH is another ambitious series from Tim Kring that is beautifully executed and has incredibly resonant themes for our times,” said Reilly. “With Kiefer back on the network as the face and force behind this creative new series, I’m confident it will resonate with viewers this spring.”

“Every once in a while, you encounter a piece of material that you just cannot say no to,” Sutherland added. “That, combined with the opportunity to work again with Peter Chernin and the Fox studio and network, makes me thrilled to be a part of this project. I also look forward to working with an extraordinary writer and producer like Tim Kring.”

TOUCH is a distinct and colorful drama in which science and spirituality intersect with the hopeful premise that we are all interconnected, tied in invisible ways to those whose lives we are destined to alter and impact.

At the center of TOUCH is MARTIN BOHM (Sutherland), a widower and single father, haunted by an inability to connect to his mute 11-year-old son, JAKE (David Mazouz). After multiple failed attempts at keeping Jake in school, Martin is visited by CLEA HOPKINS (Gugu Mbatha-Raw), a social worker sent to evaluate Jake’s well-being. Everything changes when Martin discovers that Jake possesses the gift of staggering genius – the ability to see things that no one else can and the patterns that connect seemingly unrelated events. Jake is indeed communicating. But it’s not with words, it’s with numbers. Martin meets ARTHUR DEWITT (Danny Glover), a professor and an expert on children who possess special gifts when it comes to numbers. Now, it’s up to Martin to decipher the meaning and connect the numbers to the cast of characters whose lives they affect.

TOUCH is a production of Chernin Entertainment and Tailwind Productions, in association with 20th Century Fox Television. Tim Kring created the series and wrote the pilot. Kring, Francis Lawrence, Peter Chernin (NEW GIRL, TERRA NOVA), Katherine Pope (NEW GIRL, TERRA NOVA), Sutherland, Suzan Bymel (“The War at Home”) and Carol Barbee (“Jericho”) are executive producers. Lawrence directed the pilot.

no matter how many times a manager fails, he always seems to get a new gig
this show may work, because it seems like a central character wont have any arc at all
but if you wanna see how an autistic with powers should be dealt with...watch alphas

As long as it doesn't have a second season it will be great. That's what destroyed Heroes. I've never seen a series go from about the best thing on TV to utter TRASH in seriously 1 episode like Heroes did.

Hard to imagine a positive outcome with that partnership.
EASY to imagine a promising partial first season that (a) starts out Great, and (b) gets cancelled by Fox mid-season, or (c) declines into a rambling story arc that loses all connection to the things that started it off great, or (d) all of th e above.
Will it be set in Ancient Feudal Southern California?

Gotta question what is going through Kiefer's head on this one. Kring is a talentless douche.
And Danny Glover on TV? Really? Tough guy to figure out, I thought he was basically retired but every now and then he shows up out of nowhere.
Gugu is incredibly sexy but I'm guessing that she'll keep it wrapped up for this sort of role. Oh well, the Kring Kiss of Death ensures that she'll be looking for work again soon.

The pilot and all the episodes Kring doesn't write or get involved with have the potential to be okay.
Still doubt this could be good and will stay way until there is good word-of-mouth on at least a couple of seasons worth of episodes...which I am pretty sure means I will never see this.

I loved that show so much via S1, but it quickly became apparent that he went the X Files "make it up as you go" route. I so loved S1, then the following seasons just buttfucked me, much like the Matrix sequels. I boycott anything Kring tries at this point....and my daughter actually is autistic.

Map out you primary story arcs BEFORE you start shooting the season. Also, make sure your writers are talking to each other. Slyar flip flopping between "accepting his true nature as a bad guy" and "realizing the error of his ways and seeking redemption" was one of the most ridiculous things to happen on any TV show I've ever seen. It had more insane plot twist than the last half hour of The Village.

...Continues to go back to the same 'Last Big Thing' they had any measure of success, endlessly trying to reissue and grind out the same shit with different actors?
It follows with my 'George Lucas is a dog' theory, in where he keeps returning to the place where he felt the most passion and hunger to prove he is still relevant.
He's like a dog that keeps returning to the same spot on the carpet where he once vomited, but the spot's been licked clear down to the floorboards already.

The biggest flaw in Heroes was the time-travel/visions of the future aspect. It took away all suspense, threat and mystery from the series because we knew where were heading all the time.
And it hamstrung the writers into including nods to the future all the time and distracting from telling an actual story. It's a similar problem the Star Wars prequels had.

The problem with seeing the future is that this is such a powerful ability that they have to find some way to restrict its usefulness, usually by having the individual unable to communicate simply and succinctly what they know (remember the cryptic 'save the cheerleader, save the world' thing?). Or else they don't see anything really useful. 'X', a Japanese anime film was a great example of this latter as a someone could see the future alright. She could tell you that the #7 bus would be five minutes early that afternoon, could tell you your dog would slip its leash and run away that evening, could tell you you'd break your glasses getting out of bed in the morning ... and somehow fail to note WW III would break out overnight. I'm not expecting this one to be any different. I'll pass.

does every autistic kid in film have to have some ridiculously specific sci-fi talent or genius gift? Would a movie or show about a normal autistic person really not be better? My brother is autistic, and I can tell you, they don't have to be a football star or a Precog to be interesting.

you guys gotta actually read or do research sometimes instead of mindlessly complaining all the time. theres a reason why movie studios remake old successful movies and why Tv remakes different versions of things with the same theme...its an almost guarantee that people will spend money to see something that theyre familiar with in the theaters, and guarantee that the studios will greenlight it for tv..a famous screenwriter once wrote that its not unoriginal, its something called a "presold franchise" ...thats why you remake, say, robocop...because everyone willl go see it, bottom line....so something like this with an autistic kid and a mysterious premise with keither sutherland attached and danny glover...2 ex movie stars, its a done deal for any studio......and you know why?? because too many of u people out there will not give anything original a chance, you wont spend movie theater tickets, or dedicate an hour of your life a week to something "original" and networks and studios know that...so unless there is a mass shift away from the familiar, this trend will continue...dont blame others, blame yourselves.....anyways the idea sounds cool, and all of u people sayin how lame and unoriginal it is , will watch it. start liking it, then complain about it later after its cancelled, and about how you will never watch a show again until it hits a 3rd season.....its a cycle. see a pattern emerging here ?

mirrors was a good movie......24 on the other hand, shoulda been cancelled like 3 seasons earlier. Every episode could be explained with the same sentence. "jack baur runs around yelling at everyone, shoots a few people, talks to the president, shoots some more people, the end" it was really bad, and thats what some of you call "great" and then have the nerve to say the transformers films were "bad"

LOST was only a disappointment to those that never understood the basic idea of the show from the very first episode. The show was always about the people, and the things that led them to the island, why the island drew each of them there, then compelled them to return, and how each of them finally came to terms with the mess of their lives, and came out better in the end. Those that focused on the island, and the mysteries, and felt that things werent fully explained missed the whole point.
The ending was one of THE best series finales ive ever seen, maybe even THE BEST.
as for HEROES, i thought it did have a proper ending, as i did love the entire series. The fact that it ended the same way it began, kinda like LOST, was very fitting. The first scene in HEROES is claire secretly filming herself to test her ability, the last scene was her demonstrating her ability, but this time to a worldwide audience. using the same line "my name is claire bennett......" if thats not a show coming full circle i dont know what is...you know what stinks, when a show ends with a cliffhanger and never comes back.......flash forward, V, surface, they should give shows a 2 season chance to catch an audience, or at the very least, finish a story.....

Heroes never soared to the same heights as LOST, meaning the depths it plundered could never be as disappointing.
And to ihatefanboys, did you honestly think that *before* season 6 started? Or were you, like the rest of us, expecting, you know, some sort of answers on a mystery TV show?
I guess I just "missed the point" then. Although the only point LOST had to make was "if your fanbase is rabid enough, they'll swallow any bullshit you throw at them, even if it does involve Heaven, magic caves and spells".
Despite all that though, I'd still trust Lindelof more as a showrunner than Kring. That guy just has no idea about story beyond initial set-up...

For those who loved Lost until the finale, then were disappointed because they didn't get "the answers" - you completely missed the intent of the show.
And that is why it was groundbreaking TV - it did not cater to expectations, created a new form of storytelling - and was loved for these reasons.
To then expect the show to become something different than what it was all along -well that anticipation suggests you wanted this distinctly different show to just become "normal", which it never was, while satisfying personal cravings for answers, or different answers.
Some people were on the bus for the whole trip, and some thought they were, but never really got on.
Heroes had an intriguing idea, but totally blew it by the end of season 1.

Heroes was a twinkie that only got worse, no big surprise.
The problem with the show besides being tedious and inert was that it had no purpose. Why did these people have special powers? Why didn't they gradually come together and do a modern, take on the Justice League with the heroes staying secret and keeping it from their families. Saving people's lives, stopping crime etc.....anything would have been better than what we got. Ugh.

Even a mystery has a reveal at some point. Lost sucks because it had no idea what it was doing. Yet it tricked u into thinking it was the smartest kid in the class. Looking back it was stalling. What the hell did Faraday and the time travel have anything to do with that finale? Or the smoke monster or the french woman....DUMB!
Its not groundbreaking tv when it cheats its way to the end.
They created this strange litlte universe and the come the finale, ohh by the way.... fuck that.
It was cheating, it was cowardice and totally uncalled for.
The show as it stands now has no re-watchability! Unless your deranged, why set through that tedium twice!

First part with the final Cylon fight was as epic as it gets, incredible. THEN...
Oh Starbuck is angel or something. Hours and hours of buildup with her drawings and visions and bla bla bla come to a thrilling climax when she plays a few notes on a piano then dissapears next to Apollo. HUGE buildup to nothing.
But when it was great. It was amazing. Too bad it fizzled with its explanations.

Ali Larter. Her story line completely dragged. Too many "main" characters. Hiro's story was great. Syler as the man of mystery was great. The relationship between the Petrelli brothers was the best part. Mohinder did a good job of being or exposition character by learning just a little more than we did as time went on to explain it to us. Psychic cop was still a good sidestory. What they should have done was focus on the main guys: Hiro and Peter. Let the side characters add on as the seasons passed by. Decent cloak and dagger stuff with the Petrelli family and Claire. HRG was a great foil for the heroes, but not the main character material they made him to be later. The finale just fell fuckin' flat. Peter should have held his own against Syler. I know they wanted Nathan to save the day, but Peter should have grabbed Syler when he was going supernova and pull him up into the atmosphere. Syler should have always been in wait for his final confrontation with Peter, his arch nemesis. He went from bad to good to bad to good to bad to good. Dumbing Peter's powers down as the hero only to make Syler invincible in kind, then turn him good, defeated the idea of depowering Peter, which they should not have done in the first place. Escept for Ali Larter's retarded storyline, I could not wait to see the show every damn week that first season.

What did Faraday, time travel, or the somke monster, or Rousseau have to do with the finale? I'm not sure I understand the question. Why did they have to mean anything to the finale? They were simply parts in the process of telling the story of the main characters.

and for some reason, I got a BAD feeling that it was all going nowhere, so I stopped watching. A very close friend of mine was extremely disappointed by the ending and he LOVED him some Lost for all those years. At times, it seemed he lived purely to see what would happen at the end of that show. I know a lot of people got off on the how great the characters were and learning about their past, but if I want great characters, I pop in The Godfather, Cuckoo's Nest, Dog Day Afternoon, Jaws... what I love about television (and what it, largely, fails to do) is that you can have these multi-season mysteries and epic reveals. Fuck J.J.'s 'nobody cares what's in the box' bullshit... I CARE WHAT'S IN THE BOX. You can make it relevant to character AND have it be awesome in the 'holy shit, thats what this was all leading to!' aspect.
And I DO believe it's possible, if you do your homework very early on and plot out those mysteries, to wind your way towards the end in a satisfying fashion. I've been watching 'The Mentalist' and I get the feeling they may have actually done their homework. There's already been a few satisfying reveals or spine-tingling moments on that show...

was that fuckface and other fuckface lied during the first season and told the fan base that everything was planned out and that they weren't making shit up as they went along. But, I still enjoyed it overall.

they were in Purgatory. However, when everyone figured that out, and they got renewed and had to stretch it out multiple seasons, they had to come up with something else.
Besides, I think it's been said many times (although it may just be back-peddling, like the whole Harry/Brian Cox kerfuffle), them saying they always knew how it would end meant they knew the final shot (Jack's eye) and not meaning how it would all wrap come together in the end.

Because it makes no damn sense otherwise. I thought the time travel stuff was going to lead to a big reveal of aliens or something cool.
Could you imagine if "Star Trek: TNG" had pulled dumb shit like that with its finale? Making crap up for the sake of it? Thats not good television, its lazy writing and insulting as a viewer.

Hey, somebody hadda say it. She is stunningly lovely- can't-take-your-eyes-off-her lovely. Which made the suckage of "Undercovers" that much more painful.
Tim Kring- ugh. "Crossing Jordan" was embarrassingly mediocre. I still remember ROTFLMAO at her daddy Ken Howard's laughably bad Bawston accent. "Jerdan!" terrible show.
So I was surprised that most of the first season of Heroes was so good- imaginative, and unlike anything else on at the time. A very decent ensemble cast. Still, it was clear they ran out of ideas quickly, the seams were starting to show- and his mediocrity rose to the surface.
FRINGE tonight!

I guess I'm in the minority that really liked Heroes until the writing degenerated to something only a child could watch.
Most of these 'showrunners' involved in TV sci-fi have literally no science education.
They basically feel free to make up songs about how they invented outer space.....
The only exception I can recall is The Sarah Conner chronicles where advanced concepts were discussed without being dumbed down so TV execs could follow it.

as two different characters. worse than any Soap opera. What's bad was that her character was so interesting with the dual personalities. So they had her killed and brought a more boring version of her.